


To Be Like You

by polaroid15



Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Blood and Injury, Dealing With Trauma, Found Family, Gen, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Irondad, Panic Attacks, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker Whump, Post-Vulture fight, Protective Tony Stark, Recovery, The Warehouse - Freeform, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, post-Homecoming, spider-man homecoming - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-20 13:13:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30005406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polaroid15/pseuds/polaroid15
Summary: I’ll kill you and everyone you love. I’ll kill you dead.Peter closes his eyes to keep the world from spinning. His panic sits like putty in his throat, blocking the air from reaching his lungs. He wraps his fingers around his neck, his pulse erratic underneath like he had just finished running a mile.Come on Peter. Come on Spider-Man.---Or, the missing scene in Homecoming after the vulture fight.
Relationships: Happy Hogan & Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 59
Kudos: 272





	To Be Like You

**Author's Note:**

> GUYS OH MY GOODNESS HI HELLO I'VE MISSED YOU!!!! How the heck have you been?! ;) I just finished my last midterm today so ta-da, here I am haha. 
> 
> Okay so not going to lie I'm really excited about this fic. It's a doozy and I put my whole heart and soul into it :) It was weird writing Irondad so new into their relationship but hopefully I captured it okay! When I rewatched Homecoming recently the part where Tony says "it's not working out" after the ferry scene literally GUTTED me and that's basically the seed for this fic. 
> 
> I really hope you enjoy! Thanks as always for everything <3 :) 
> 
> p.s. welcome back to the angst train! Haha <3

_It’s not working out._

_I wanted you to be better._

There’s sand in Peter’s eyes, in his cuts. It mixes with his blood and adds to the ache, stinging and burning every inch of his skin like fire. 

It hurts, but really it’s nothing in comparison to the heaviness in his chest. 

_I’m going to need the suit back._

Mr. Stark. Toomes. Homecoming. 

He’s not exactly sure how he ended up on the cyclone, everything in his recent memory a dark blur. One moment he’s standing in front of Toomes, the last of his energy spent in cleaning up the beach and the next he’s sitting in the sky. The air is colder up here, but he’s too in shock to really feel it. Besides, it doesn’t come close to how cold it had been on the plane.

Before he had crashed it, of course. 

Or when Toomes had dropped him in the river. 

_I lost the internship._

Logically he knows he needs to move, that he needs to go home, but the low-burning fire on the beach distracts him and steals all his attention along with the breath in his chest. He stares and reimagines the impact of the plane hitting the earth, of Toomes slamming him into the sand. The burns on his hands make them tremble and the pain brings tears to his eyes. 

_If you’re nothing without the suit you shouldn’t have it._

_I’m trying to save you!_

He wants to go home, crawl under his covers, bury his day deep underground and let it die. To wake up tomorrow and for everything to go back to the way it was.

But he can’t, the prospect impossible. 

May is home. 

It’ll break her heart. 

Nothing will ever be the same again and the deep-rooted sadness that accompanies the realization threatens him to tears. 

_You smell like garbage._

Ned could help him. Ned can help-

It’s almost enough to spur Peter into action. But then he pictures Ned at homecoming with the rest of the normal kids and a deep pain separate from his physical infirmities cuts through him like a knife. 

Like a talon in his chest. 

Ned doesn’t deserve it, Peter realizes bitterly, even if he is his guy in the chair. Besides, Peter can barely fathom the energy to move off the cyclone let alone travel all the way to Ned’s house. 

He has no phone. He’s out of web shooter fluid. 

He’s out of options. 

_Hey. I just saved your life. Now what do you say?_

_Thank you._

A low noise of anguish comes out of his throat, surprising him. Through the smoke and the fire he can see Toomes’s legs jutting out in the sand. He hasn’t moved, hasn’t tried to escape. 

_I’ll kill you and everyone you love. I’ll kill you dead._

Peter closes his eyes to keep the world from spinning. His panic sits like putty in his throat, blocking the air from reaching his lungs. He wraps his fingers around his neck, his pulse erratic underneath like he had just finished running a mile. 

_Come on Peter. Come on Spider-Man._

A sob rips through him, and out of everything that has happened tonight, it’s what surprises him the most. Tony abandoning him, the warehouse crushing him, getting thrown off a plane, his fight with Toomes- it’s all too much and he _can’t breathe-_

Lights and sirens coax his eyes open, though the tears in them make it near impossible to see. There’s ambulances and firetrucks and police cruisers. 

To clean up the mess he made. 

_Is everyone okay?_

_No thanks to you._

He’s too tired to be relieved. 

He doesn’t look for Happy’s car. 

_Sorry doesn’t cut it._

He should go to Ned’s. 

Peter tries to move. Can’t. An overwhelming chill infects his body. He feels lightheaded and woozy and somewhere through the cutting numbness he feels his entire body give up on him. It’s deep, bordering on bone dead exhaustion. When he reaches up his fingers to touch at his chest they come away painted red. 

Red, like May’s hair. 

Red, like Tony’s armour. 

Red, like the suit he had lost.

A deep nausea starts at the base of his gut and his vision shifts like a kaleidoscope. Only now does he realize how badly he’s screwed up, how he’s going to bleed out on the _cyclone_ of all places. 

He doesn’t have his phone, doesn’t have Karen or Mr. Stark or anybody. For once his inability to ask for help is entirely his own fault. There are no plan b’s, no second chances. 

He’s alone. 

It’s scary. 

_Come on Peter. Come on Spider-Man._

A bus was thrown at him, a warehouse dropped on his shoulders. He crashed a plane and fought a man with metal wings. It had taken strength. More than he’s ever had to use in his life. 

And where is that strength now?

He doesn’t even have the energy to wipe the tears off his cheeks. 

Through depleting vision, he sees blurred figures approach Toomes, the lights of their flashlights hitting his makeshift prison. 

_It’s over_ , he thinks, but it’s empty and cold. It doesn’t feel anything like he had hoped it would. And maybe that’s what it means to be a hero- to feel like you lose even when you win. 

He wants to go home. 

But he can’t. 

The beach turns black, his chin lolling down to rest on his chest. 

He’s so tired. 

\-----

Tony hadn’t quite expected to end his night on the beach and especially not surrounded by the burning remnants of his belongings. The plane had sheared an ugly line on the coast, though the damage is admittedly nowhere as catastrophic as it could have been.

Everyone is safe, they had assured him. No casualties. 

Regardless Happy is a mess, unable to look him in the eye. Tony tries hard not to be upset at him.

His friend comes up to him now. His face is pale and ashen, the panic in it accentuated by the low light of the ruin around them. Breathless, Happy gestures over his shoulder with his thumb. “We uh- we found something boss. Over here.”

Feet sinking into the sand, Tony stumbles after him. It doesn’t take long for Tony to see their destination, standing straight like a beacon through the destruction. All the valuables on the plane, _everything,_ stacked together neatly. A man is sitting at the base of the pile. The Vulture, Tony realizes darkly. 

But it’s not what has the breath stalling in his chest. 

It’s the webbing holding everything together. 

_Peter._

World narrowing and ears ringing, Tony crosses the rest of the distance to stand in front of the criminal. He looks smug, Tony thinks, and a little more than rough around the edges. His clothes smoke on their edges. There’s blood in his hairline and under his nose. 

And beside his face, stuck to the mess, a note from Spider-Man. 

_P.S. Sorry about the plane._

“Where is he?” Tony asks, his fingers curling involuntarily into fists. The rational part of his mind is telling him to calm down, because Peter wouldn’t have been able to clean up the beach if he were dead. 

_He’s okay. He has to be okay._

Toomes smiles crookedly at him, reflecting behind it some forerign aspect of loss beyond the visible world. Tony has seen it hundreds of times, feels the weight behind it. “Pedro?” Toomes asks lightly, and Tony’s blood turns to ice. “Dead, hopefully.”

Happy holds him back from slamming his fist into Toomes’s teeth, though his own face reddens with anger. “You know who he is,” Tony says instead, accusatory to cover the fear creating a sinkhole in his chest. “How?”

Smirk unfailing, Toomes shrugs as if he hadn’t just been beat by a fifteen year old kid. “He was my daughter’s date to homecoming. _Too bad he missed it._ ”

Happy swears viciously and let’s Tony go, taking a resolved step back. Freed, Tony drops to his knees in the hot sand and wraps his fist around Toomes’s collar. He can hear his heartbeat in his ears. “Listen closely bird man. If you’ve done anything to hurt that boy I swear to God I’ll end you. You’ll never see the light of day again, you hear? Now _where the hell is he?_ ”

Toomes doesn’t flinch. Eyes reflecting fire, he returns Tony’s passion in equal measure. “ _He_ was the one so hellbent on fighting me. Besides, aren’t _you_ supposed to be his damn babysitter?”

“WHERE IS HE?”

Toomes laughs. _Laughs._ He spits out blood. “I don’t know. I don’t care.” 

“I’ll kill you.”

“I’d prefer it.”

Disgusted, Tony releases his grip and stands back. He looks towards the water and wishes he could hear the waves hitting shore instead of the uncomfortable buzz in his ears. “You knew he was fifteen,” Tony says, “and you still did this.”

“You did too. Don’t pretend you’re better than me, Stark.”

It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Something rockhard, something he thought was untouchable, shatters in his chest. It leaves him feeling sick and twisted and he fights the urge to throw up. 

_What if somebody had died tonight? Different story right? Cause that’s on you._

_And if you die, I feel like that’s on me. I don’t need that on my conscience._

“Have fun in jail,” Tony says, but there’s no heat behind it. Because criminal or not, Toomes isright.He’s let Peter down. Big time. He turns to Happy and hopes to the universe that the split in his chest isn’t visible on his face. “Leave him. We gotta find the kid.”

“Better hurry,” Toomes says, coughing against the smoke. Some of his bravo is failing. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he bleeds out within the hour.” It’s said in anger but Tony is familiar enough with facades to know that Toomes has constructed one of his own. _He’s worried_. 

And if Toomes is worried, Tony is three seconds away from a full blown panic attack. He turns away from the scene without another word, holding his breath so it doesn’t leave somewhere he can’t get it back from. Happy stays by his side, matching his strides with precision and hand outstretched should Tony need it. 

“I’ve messed up,” Tony says. 

“We all have.”

“I have to find him.”

Happy straightens, eyes cutting across the beach. “He could be anywhere by now.”

If his friend says anything else it dies in the sudden roar in his ears. His eyes attach to a speck of blue and red under the lowlights of the amusement park as if the gods themselves have orchestrated the connection. Even from the distance Tony knows without a doubt that it’s Peter.

_I tried to tell you about it but you didn’t listen! None of this would’ve happened if you had just listened to me!_

_If you cared you’d actually be here._

“I see him.” His mouth is numb. 

“What?”

“I see the kid.”

“Where?”

“Oh God. I need a suit.” 

“Tony calm down-”

“I need a suit!” 

And they’re running. 

\----

Peter is prodded back to existence by something warm on his shoulder. A faint murmur registers in the back of his mind, like TV static or hearing someone talking from a different room. 

_So tired._

“Kid? Peter?”

The surface is painful, he decides, so he sinks further. 

“ _Parker!_ Open your eyes right now. That’s an order, you hear me?” 

The voice is familiar. He wants to listen. He tries, but his eyes stick as if fused together with cement. 

_Cement._ The warehouse. Thousands of pounds crushing him, making it impossible to breathe-

He gasps, his body jerking involuntarily with the movement. It makes every ache and pain in his chest triple and he _can’t breathe and he can’t move and he’s being crushed._ It’s cold. He sees nothing but sky and loses his grip.

And then he’s falling. 

The ground rushes up to meet him in a disorienting blur and it’s only then he remembers. Toomes. The beach. The cyclone. The fact that he’s out of web fluid. 

He doesn’t have the time or energy to scream before his descent is halted, the warmth from before attaching itself around his biceps and lowering him gently to the ground. Peter collapses against it, grateful, and looks up to his rescuer. 

An Iron Man suit, the eyes blank and angry. 

_Sorry doesn’t cut it._

Something heavy rolls through him and he scrambles back, his breathing ratcheting up like clockwork. The blood on his hands leave marks on the pavement. “Mr- Mr. Stark. Oh man. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry-”

Tony emerges from the suit and it’s him, really him. Just like after the ferry. It’s surprising enough to stop his backward scramble and stare at the worried lines in Tony’s face, in the transparent fear in his eyes. He rushes to close the distance Peter had made between them, squatting down close. “Kid?” he asks, his tone thick with something foreign. 

_He should be angry. He’s supposed to be angry. Why doesn’t he look angry?_

“I’m sorry,” Peter says again, blinking slowly.

“Don’t be sorry,” Tony says. Behind him, a sleek black car pulls up. Happy exits from the driver’s seat and Peter forgets how to breathe again. 

_Is everyone safe?_

_No thanks to you._

_No thanks to me?_

“I messed everything up,” Peter murmurs, backing away further until his back hits something cold and metal. “Oh man. Your- your _plane._ I’m so sorry.”

Everything blurs again. Distantly he’s aware of Tony approaching him but Peter must make a noise because he stops short. 

“You’re hurt,” Tony says, something like pleading in his voice. 

“No. I- I’m fine.”

“No, Peter. You’re not.”

_I was the only one who believed in you. Everyone else said I was crazy to recruit a fourteen year old kid._

_I’m fifteen-_

_No. This is where you zip it! The adult is talking._

“I said- I said I’m fine.” As if to prove it, Peter struggles to his feet because he _doesn’t need their help._ Tony walked away. Happy ignored him.

These are the facts. 

Standing is harder than he anticipates and he can’t help but cry out against the new pain it brings, swaying when it makes him dizzy. Something warm trickles down from his chest and back. He sees double. “I’m okay,” he pants, “I’m sorry.”

“ _You’re not fine!”_ Tony yells. 

Peter flinches. 

Tony does too. 

He wants Ned. He wants May. He wants everything to be okay. 

_It’s not working out. I’m going to need the suit back._

“I gotta go,” Peter mumbles, but the world is dissolving. He tries to walk away, to show them that he’s as independent as they want him to be. “I gotta go home.”

He doesn’t even make it two steps. 

Tony catches him when he falls and Peter doesn’t have the control or strength to push him away. 

_I just wanted to be like you._

_And I wanted you to be better._

“Help me get him to the car.”

And like a mountain of cement crashing down over his head, everything turns dark. 

\-----

Peter collapsing chalks up to be one of the most terrifying experiences of Tony’s life. It’s worse than when he had fallen off the cyclone just minutes before, worse than finding Peter strung up between a divided ferry. 

He catches the kid before his head hits the ground and promises himself that from here on out, it’s a permanent part of his job description. 

Together they manage to haul Peter into the back of the car. Tony crawls in beside him and brings Peter’s head onto his lap, pressing shaking hands down against the worst of the bleeding. Happy scrambles to the driver’s seat, tires kicking up smoke as they peel out of the lot.

Peter looks terrible. 

_He looks dead._

Pale and bloody, his eyelids bruised and tear tracks cutting through the ash and grime on his cheeks. He’s wearing his original suit. _Pajamas,_ as he had first referred to them as. They’re ripped to shreds, charred and stained with crimson. 

_I’m going to need the suit back._

Tony’s hands are red. He did this. 

“Drive faster,” he says. 

“I am.”

“Driver faster!”

“Tony-”

“Just _do it.”_

Peter’s head lolls with the movement of the car. He looks small and weak and fragile. He looks exactly how Tony never wanted to see him. 

He should be at homecoming dancing with his friends. Not here, not hurt.

_Your fault,_ his mind screams at him. _This is on you._

“How much farther to the Tower?” he asks, throat constricting. 

Happy’s sympathetic eyes find him in the rearview mirror. “The Tower’s empty, remember? We’re going to the hospital. Ten minutes tops.” 

_Christ._ Of course it’s empty.

Because he left. He walked away and took Peter’s only protection with him. 

_Your fault. All your damn fault-_

“Make it five.”

Peter moans, scrunches his eyes before opening them. Tony pats his cheek lightly in hopes to rouse him further. “Underoos?” he prompts. “You back with us?”

Cloudy eyes meet his own but don’t connect. 

“M’ St’k?” 

“Y-yeah kid. You’re going to be okay.”

Peter’s breath hitches, speeding up. “I’m sorry,” he whispers in anguish. “‘M so s’ry.” 

“Peter don’t-”

“Wanted to be better,” he slurs. Weak and uncoordinated fingers latch onto Tony’s sleeve, leaving smudges of red. “‘M sorry. Wanted to be better.”

Happy stiffens. Tony forgets how to breathe. 

“It hurts Mr. Stark.”

He’s out of his depth, drowning in the deep end. 

“Comfort him!” Happy snaps from the driver’s seat. 

Tony feels dizzy. He pats Peter’s head once, twice. More blood transfers onto his palm. “It’ll be okay bud. We’re getting you help. It’ll stop hurting soon I promise.”

Peter closes his eyes. “W’nted to be better.” 

Happy accelerates. 

\----

Happy Hogan’s defenses are crumbling. 

Cracking, tumbling, like Humpty Dumpty on his goddamn wall. 

Because it’s _Peter_ , and it’s the plane, and none of this would’ve happened if he hadn’t been such an idiot. 

Everything after pulling up to the hospital is a blur. He remembers parking behind an ambulance, remembers his hands shaking too badly to twist the key out of the ignition. He remembers Peter tucked against Tony’s side in the back seat, dead quiet as Tony hyperventilates.

“He’s- he’s not waking up Hap.” 

“He’s going to be fine.” 

“He’s- he’s-” 

“ _Breathe Tony.”_

And then they’re inside, carrying Peter between them like a ragdoll. He doesn’t make a sound, lax and broken and it’s _all his fault._

It doesn’t take long before Peter is scooped up by a team of doctors. The loss of the kid’s weight leaves Happy feeling cold. He stands in the middle of the hall and watches as Tony follows the staff pushing Peter along on a stretcher. Even from his position he can hear Tony talking frantically about NDAs and giving Peter the best treatment they’ve ever given anyone in their entire careers or so help them- 

Eventually Tony can’t go any further. He stops at the swing of a double door, his palm resting on the glass as Peter is whisked away. 

The hand curls into a fist. 

Crimson smears under the movement. 

Happy finds the strength to move. One step, two, until he’s at Tony’s side. He’s scared to touch him, to break something else, but finally works up the courage to lay and hand on his shoulder. 

“Let’s sit down,” is all he can manage. 

Tony doesn’t say anything, looking nearly as pale as the kid had been. He allows Happy to steer him into the waiting room and flips off other visitors as they gasp and stare. They find a quiet corner and sink into separate chairs. 

They don’t speak for an hour. 

Cho finds them at the tail end of the time. Happy is surprised to see her and figures somewhere in this whole mess Tony reached out to her. Her hair is windblown and her eyes are wide and alert, ready to jump in and intervene. 

“Where did they take him?” is all she asks. 

Tony moves for the first time, pointing towards the doors of surgery. 

As quick as she had appeared, Cho is gone. 

“Damn it,” Tony whispers, sinking low into his chair. The blood on his hands is dry now, flaking off his skin when he reaches up to rub tiredly at his face. It’s only now that Happy realizes his own hands have Peter’s blood on them too. 

“It’s not your fault,” Happy says. The walls are closing in, the temperature seeming to increase by ten degrees.

“It _is_ my fault. I dragged him to Germany. I gave him a suit, I gave him protection, and then I just yanked it all out from under his feet. I didn’t even have the guts to wait and see if he stuck the landing.”

Happy swallows. “Peter is stubborn. We both know that. You did the right thing-”

Tony shakes his head violently, throwing up a hand to cut him off. “No, no. You don’t understand. That kid is _fifteen years old!”_

“I know, Tony.”

“He should be at homecoming with his friends right now.”

“I know.”

“He’s bleeding out in a set of glorified pajamas because I was too scared to trust him.” 

“We’ve all made mistakes here.”

Tony is quiet, looking at him with red rimmed and bloodshot eyes. “He’s just a kid, Hap. He didn’t even call for help. He doesn’t- he doesn’t trust me anymore. And he _still_ saved all my crap. Do you know how much damage that stuff would have caused in the wrong hands?” 

_Yes._ Stomach sinking, Happy looks to the doors Peter had disappeared through. He wishes for the kid to come cartwheeling out in his usual energy, in one piece and alive. Bragging about churros and bike robberies and Star Wars-

“Happy?”

Tony’s voice is disant. 

“ _Happy.”_

“What?” His throat is dry.

“What are you not telling me?”

Pretending not to feel the blood on his hands, Happy shifts uncomfortably in the cheap hospital chair. “I was stressed about the move,” he says slowly, “and you know what the kid’s been like. Calling and texting about every little thing since Germany.”

Tony is silent, the tension between them thick enough to cut. 

“His friend called tonight. Before the plane went down. To warn me, I’m sure.”

“And?” Tony prompts, but the tone of his voice tells Happy he already knows the answer. 

“I didn’t hear him out. I hung up. It’s my fault Peter had to do this alone.”

Keeping his focus anywhere but Tony is easy but it doesn’t save him from the reaction. He hears a sharp intake of breath, a muted curse. Tony stands, towering above him. He walks away, disappears, and for a moment Happy thinks it’s over. He hangs his head between his knees. 

Then Tony’s shoes come into his field of vision. “We all made mistakes here,” he says. 

And that’s it. 

Tony sits back down and Happy holds his breath until Cho comes back through the doors. She approaches them quickly, her face completely neutral. 

She looks at Tony and Tony alone, his face pained enough to know it must be the priority. 

“Is he-?”

“He’ll be fine.”

Tony sags against the chair and covers his eyes with his hands, gasping for breath as if emerging from deep water. Cho waits patiently for Tony to collect himself and it gives Happy equal opportunity to blink the relief out of his eyes. 

_He’ll be fine. He’s okay._

“Thank you,” Tony says, his voice cracking on the end. “Oh God. Thank you.”

Cho’s expression turns into something gentle, her voice even more so. “He’s young,” she says. 

“I know.”

“He sustained a lot of injuries. And though he’ll heal fine on the surface,” she pauses, taking a step closer, “just remember that there are wounds that you can’t see.”

Tony straightens, jaw setting. 

It feels like a mantle being set. 

“I’ll make sure he’s okay,” Tony promises. 

“Good.” Cho stands straight and pulls the clipboard that had been hanging at her hip in front of her. “Before I let you see him, there’s something I think we should discuss.”

Happy holds his breath again. It sits heavy in his chest. 

“What?”

“Peter received a variance of injuries. Puncture marks, burns, a concussion, a fractured wrist, multiple bruises and lacerations, the list goes on. All seem to coincide with the plane crash and following fight with Adrian Toomes.”

Tony stiffens, his fingernails splitting the wooden armrests of his chair. “And?” 

Cho shuffles on her feet. Happy has never seen her nervous, but she looks it now. “There was something else too,” she says. “Deep bruising around his torso with several of his ribs fractured or broken. I believe something else happened to Peter, perhaps before he got on the plane.”

Happy clears his throat, finally finding the energy to enter the conversation. Tony is sheet white, eyes blank and unblinking. “What’s your best guess?”

Sympathetic, Cho dips her head. “In my best opinion, I would say he was crushed under something with a substantial amount of weight, probably for an extended period of time. There was concrete dust all over his clothes.”

Tony sucks in a shallow breath and doesn’t release it. 

“But of course it’s all hypothetical. We won’t know anything for certain until he wakes up.”

“Which will be when?” Happy asks. 

“With his metabolism I can’t be sure. Most likely within a couple hours.”

“Can I see him?” Tony asks, voice small. 

“Of course. Follow me.”

Tony stands and doesn’t ask for Happy to follow. 

He figures he deserves it. 

So he sits alone, staring at the ceiling and wishing with every inch of his soul that he hadn’t hung up his phone. 

\----

Tony sits in the small hospital room. 

It feels like failure. 

It feels like relief. 

Peter is small against the sheets and blankets, the tubes and wires. He’s pale and marred with dark bruising but at least he’s not covered in blood anymore. 

He never wants to see Peter covered in blood again. 

The kid doesn’t stir and Tony almost wishes that he’ll stay that way, that he won’t have to face reality and fess up to his sins; that Peter will remain safe and whole and better off without him interfering. 

After a long hour of collecting himself, he calls May and asks if he can take Peter to an impromptu conference for the weekend. She sounds uncertain but ultimately caves, telling Tony to have Peter call her when they get here. 

He thanks her and tries above everything else to keep his voice steady. 

Hangs up and stares at the phone in his hand. 

Hears the machines breathing air into Peter’s nose. 

Hears other machines tracking his heart, reassuring it’s still beating. 

He lays his head onto the bed and cries bitterly. 

It’s quiet. His chest constricts. 

_Your fault._

He isn’t sure when he stops. He’s exhausted. 

The heart monitor changes. The blankets shift. 

“M’ St’k?”

The voice alleviates some of the pain in his chest. Slowly Tony raises his head, feeling slightly embarrassed the kid has found him hanging over him like some mother hen. He covers it with a smile and hopes it conveys a confidence he doesn’t feel. “Hi kid. How’re you feeling?”

Peter’s breath hitches. He looks up at the ceiling with glassy eyes, bottom lip trembling. “The roof,” he slurs, “‘s it gonna fall?”

Confused, Tony looks up. “What?”

Becoming more agitated, Peter grabs Tony’s wrist. The contact burns, makes acid rise up through his stomach. “Gonna fall. We gotta- gotta leave.”

Tony shakes his head but feels otherwise frozen. His mind is working double time trying to process that Peter’s hand is latching onto him, looking at him in a way that signals the difference between life and death. “The roof’s not going to fall,” he says. “You’re okay. Everything’s okay now.”

Unconvinced, Peter lays his head back and squeezes his eyes closed, his grip on Tony unfailing. “No. Falling. Hur’s.”

“I’m so sorry kid.”

“Plane fell too. Plane. _Fire._ ”

“Peter-”

The kid’s eyes grow wide, impossibly so. There’s no coherence behind them, only drugs and pain and fear. “Mr. Stark. My- my parents died in a plane crash.”

Tony feels his eyes sting, his throat tighten. 

“Thought I was goin’ die. See them.”

Words are impossible. 

“Hurts.”

And then Peter relaxes, closes his eyes, goes limp against the covers with a low whine. His hand is still curled tight around Tony’s wrist. He stares and stares and stares. 

Then he pulls it away, stumbles to the trash can in the corner of the room, and throws up. 

\-----

The next time Peter wakes up he’s more lucid, but barely. 

“May?” he breathes, his face pinched in pain. 

“I handled it,” Tony says. 

“The plane?”

“Everything accounted for and safe. All thanks to you.”

Deep breaths. “Happy?”

A sharp pain. “He’s okay, Peter.”

A tear. “Liz?”

“Who’s Liz?”

But Peter doesn’t answer, his eyes closing against another dose of drugs. 

The pain leaves his face in an instant. 

\----

Thirteen hours later and Peter is eating jello, eyes drooping and paler than Count Dracula. Tony sits in the corner, quiet and unsure, unable to stop watching his every move. He catches the kid throwing him hesitant looks and tries not to think of the implications behind it. 

“You can go,” Peter says after his jello is gone, setting the empty container aside. “I know- I know you're busy.”

Every inch of Tony’s body goes cold. “I’m staying right here until you're better.”

“I _feel_ better.”

“I’ll let Cho be the judge of that.”

Peter sighs and sticks out his bottom lip. “Fine.”

_None of this would have happened if you had just listened to me!_

“You should get some more rest.” 

“Alright Mr. Stark.” 

Something in the kid’s eyes is dark and sad. 

And Tony isn’t brave enough to address it. 

\-----

Tony doesn’t sleep. 

Peter does. A lot, though largely in part to the drugs still being pumped through him. It should be a peaceful sleep. God knows he deserves it. 

But he twitches and flinches. 

Whimpers. 

Cries and wakes up gasping. 

Tony sits by Peter’s side like a guard dog and talks to him after each episode until he falls back into a restless sleep. He looks at Peter’s bruised hand and is tempted to hold it like his own father never had, to assure in extra measure that everything is going to be okay. 

But he doesn’t, wishing instead he were strong enough. 

Peter doesn’t reach out for him either. 

“It’s okay,” he says, feeling powerless and unsure if Peter can hear him half the time through a panic undesigned for fifteen year old kids. “I’m here. You’re okay.” 

It helps a little. Peter apologizes over and over, and Tony tells him not to. 

“I wanted to be better,” is the core of Peter’s delirium. 

It feels like a knife to the gut.

\-----

Sleep is difficult, a plague of concrete dust and sand. 

Of not being able to breathe. 

Of hitting the ground so hard he thinks for sure all his teeth rattle out of his skull. 

He dreams about Mr. Stark standing in front of him, telling him he doesn’t deserve the suit. Of walking home in Hello Kitty pajamas. 

He dreams of Toomes pulling a gun on him in his car. 

Of the ringing in his ears after the plane had hit the ground. 

Darkness. Dust. 

_It’s not working out. I’m going to need the suit back._

An impossible weight landing on him, grinding him to dust. 

_Help! Please! I’m down here. I can’t move!_

_I’ll kill you and everyone you love. I’ll kill you dead._

He can’t breathe. He can’t breathe-

“Peter!”

The darkness changes, shifting to a light glow. It’s an unfamiliar room with unfamiliar sounds and smells. A heartbeat, loud and erratic. 

“Peter it’s okay. Wake up. You’re safe.”

“Wha-”

He gasps for air, certain there’s none despite the pressure of an oxygen tube against his nose. He claws at his chest and feels the distant sting of cuts. 

“Peter you gotta _breathe_.”

It’s Tony. His face swims in front of Peter, looking just as panicked as Peter feels. _Why is Tony here? Where is here-_

“Breathe, bud. Listen to me, okay? Use those freaky spider powers to listen to me breathe.”

“Mr. Stark-”

“It’s okay. You can do it.” Peter flinches when Tony grabs his hand. He brings it flush against his chest, rising and falling in exaggeration. “Follow this, okay? You can do it kid.”

He tries. 

After a while, he succeeds. 

Air has never felt so good. 

Peter falls back against his pillows but Tony doesn’t let go. He feels exhausted, chest and ribs burning, his mind foggy. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles through numb lips. “What- what happened?”

Tony’s grip tightens. “You were panicking.” 

“Oh.” Something in Tony’s expression tells him that it might not have been the first time. 

“How are you feeling now?”

Peter shrugs, eyes fluttering but remaining open. Everything comes rushing back to him now. Toomes, falling off the cyclone, being brought here. Tony, for some reason, refusing to leave his side and bringing him jello. “Mm. Tired. Sore.”

“Do you- do you want to talk about it?” 

_No._

He shrugs. 

Tony is quiet for a long time. “I’m really sorry Peter,” he says. His voice is different, heavy in a way Peter has never heard before. “I should’ve never let this happen.”

The pain returns to his chest and Peter smiles in an attempt to dispel it. He tries for humour, a language they both share. “I’m the one that screwed the pooch, remember?” 

Tony stills. 

“Peter look at me.”

He does. 

“You definitely did screw the pooch,” he agrees, “at the ferry. But nothing after, you hear? That was- that was all on me. I screwed the pooch too.”

Peter furrows his brows, shimmying up his stance against the pillows. It hurts, but this is more important. “What? You did nothing wrong.”

“I took away the thing I specifically designed to keep you safe. We didn’t listen to you. We let you go through that alone. You should’ve been at homecoming, Pete. You shouldn’t have had to go through what you did.”

“Toomes was my date’s dad,” Peter admits, then laughs hysterically. It really is funny. “He pulled a gun on me in the car and then-” his mouth goes sour. 

Tony’s eyebrows raise. He isn’t smiling. “A gun? Peter- God. Then what?”

“Nothing.”

“Tell me.”

Peter sighs. Closes his eyes. Wishes none of this ever happened. 

“He kind of dropped a warehouse on me. But it _really_ wasn’t a big deal, I promise! I got out before he got to the plane and everything was fine-”

“ _Fine?”_ Tony chokes. “Peter Parker that is _so astronomically far_ from fine!”

To his left, Peter hears his heart monitor double. Tony must notice it too because he visibly relaxes, though a vein pulses at his temple. 

“It was scary,” Peter admits, “I- I couldn’t move at first, or breathe. I thought I was going to die.” He pauses, eyes widening, because it’s _true._ He shakes his head to make the faint ringing in his ears leave. “It’s okay. I got through it.”

Tony’s heart is beating rapidly. Peter can hear it. He doesn’t have the strength to look at the expression on his mentor’s face. “Is that what you dreamt about earlier?” he asks quietly. 

“Does it matter?”

“Yes.”

Peter lets his shoulders fall. He picks at a string on his comforter. “Yeah,” he says softly, “it was part of it.”

Tony curses, shifts away. It feels like a gaping distance that Peter doesn’t know how to bridge. “I never should’ve taken the suit away. Your AI would have alerted me. I could have helped.”

_If you’re nothing without the suit, you shouldn’t have it._

“I get why you did. I was being irresponsible. All those people on the ferry could’ve died. I get it Mr. Stark, really.”

Tony is quiet. “If we hadn’t found you at the beach-”

“You did though,” Peter assures, even though his voice cracks. “Everything’s okay.”

_But it’s not. It’s really, really not._

Tony collapses. Peter thinks he isn’t going to say anything more on the matter. Then, “I’m sorry.”

Tears well up in Peter’s eyes. “I’m sorry too.”

And then Peter is sobbing. He can’t help it. Everything since the ferry crashes over him, drowning him. He tightens his hand over his mouth and tries to hold in the noise, turns away from Tony who is sitting shell-shocked in his chair. 

“I’m sorry,” Peter gasps between sobs, “I’m sorry-”

And then Tony is hugging him.

_That’s not a hug. I’m just grabbing the door for you. We’re not there yet._

And it makes him cry harder. 

“You’re okay,” Tony says into his hair. Confident this time. Sure. “Breathe, Pete. Things will get better. I promise you.”

“It was all so scary,” Peter whispers. For the first time it doesn’t feel like weakness. “The- the warehouse. The plane. I thought- I thought it was going to hit the city. And- and Toomes. He said he was- he said he was going to kill everyone I loved and it was- it was so scary Mr. Stark.” 

“You’re allowed to be scared. Hell, I was scared too.”

Peter regains control over his breathing and manages to hug Tony back. They stay like that for a while before separating. 

Peter pretends not to notice the shine in Tony’s eyes, too. 

“I didn’t know Iron Man was scared of anything,” he says, only partly serious.

“Well there’s not much,” Tony agrees. 

And then he laughs. 

And Peter laughs too. It’s stilted and disbelieving and _relieved._

“No more sorrys,” Peter begs between breaths. “Okay? We’re even.”

“Deal.”

They sit in a short silence. Warmth enters the room. 

“You deserve the suit,” Tony says. “I mean it kid. You did good. You did the right thing. You deserve it.”

“Mr. Stark-”

“Nope. Don’t want to hear it. My decision is final. If you proved anything tonight it’s that you’re meant to be Spider-Man. It’s who you are, kid. I’m not going to stop you from that.”

The warmth from the room moves into Peter’s chest. He stays perfectly still to prevent disturbing it. “Thanks,” he whispers, because it’s all he can manage. 

“Help me upgrade it,” Tony says. It’s an invitation, but it sounds more like a plea. “Come over to the compound on the weekends. I’ll show you the mechanics of it. We can work on it together.”

“What? Are- are you sure?”

“More than anything.”

Peter smiles as the aches and pains in his body seem to disappear. “I’d really like that,” he says. 

_If you cared you’d actually be here_. 

And he is, Peter realizes. Maybe he had been all along. 

He’s here. And for now, it’s enough. 

\-----

A month passes. 

It’s one of the best in Tony’s life. 

Peter heals and springs back like an elastic band. He smiles and talks enthusiastically about Star Wars and May and acing algebra tests. 

His scars fade. He talks to Tony on the bad days when it hurts to breathe. 

He gets help. 

They’re together now, squished side by side to peer into a magnifying glass. Peter’s leg is bouncing, lips pressed into a determined line as he tinkers with the mask under the table. “Like this?” he asks. 

Tony nods, though he doesn’t look. He already knows the kid is doing it perfectly. “Just like that.”

It hits him then, how much the kid means to him. 

Though really he knew from the very first day. From the first second. 

“Kid?” 

Peter looks up, his concentration slipping into an easy smile. “Yeah?”

It looks like trust, like family. 

“I’m just proud is all,” Tony says quickly. It’s important. “I wanted you to know that.”

“Oh,” Peter says, pink coloring his cheeks. “Thanks Mr. Stark.”

“It’s Tony, kid.”

“Whatever you say, Mr. Stark.”

_God. This child will be the death of me._ He rolls his eyes and ruffles Peter’s hair, an odd display of affection he never would have thought himself capable of. “Fine, have it your way Mr. Parker. Now get back to work already.”

“Yes sir.” His smile is wider than Tony’s ever seen it. 

_The kid._

_Peter._

He could live a lifetime of this, he thinks in content. 

And maybe, just maybe, he will. 

**Author's Note:**

> Ahhhh :) I'm really proud of how this one turned out! Irondad is l i t e r a l l y going to kill me one of these days please send help I can't stop writing about them. 
> 
> Thank you for reading!! Love you all <3 Let me know what you think! Should it be canon or not? Hahaha I vote yes :P Hope you're all having a wonderful day and have a happy and safe weekend!


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